Marketplace Reviews
Raw shot from SL
I noticed a review on marketplace earlier for these ears I’m wearing and it got me curious so I had to purchase a pair for myself to see what exactly was the issue. I don’t seem to be having any difficulty with the ears that the reviewer had in this 1-star review. (The reviewer deleted her rating & comment now but she basically called the ears “crap” and said they had “jagged edges”.) The picture in this post is a complete raw shot from SL, the only thing I did was crop it. The ears were L$175 and I normally don’t purchase or wear ears so to me that seemed like a very reasonable price. It came with a hud so that you can match the tone to your skin and I got this matched in just a minute by choosing one of the preset tones. One thing I did notice about the hud which I wasn’t used to, I am used to skin matching huds for mesh/prim feet, and they usually have an area where I can input exact rgb numbers. This hud didn’t have that but I’m not sure if that’s something most ear huds have or not, but that is the only thing I would suggest for future products, if possible. I wore this hair so that you can see the joint and all and how it matches up.
Again, I’m not a usual shopper of ears and I’m not sure exactly how it works, how much they usually are and if I’m even wearing them correctly, but it all seems fine to me. The reason I’m doing this post is because I have noticed a trend on marketplace comments and it has started worrying me. I have noticed people leaving 1-star negative reviews for various weird reasons (which are not necessarily the content creator’s fault) such as:
- Here are two 1-star reviews: For Alice Project (reviewer deleted her rating & comment now) and the other for Exile. Both of these are for failed deliveries. Something that is NOT the fault of the creator itself but instead Linden Lab. That’s like those people who write Amazon.com reviews and leave a 1-star rating and state they never received the item. The rating you give should reflect the item itself, not how it was delivered to you.
- 1-star review for Elymode: A product is mesh, it states it’s mesh but the reviewer says the item is not mesh, which is incorrect.
- 1-star review for Gos shoes: The product states it’s a fatpack, and it really IS a fatpack but instead of examining the contents carefully, a bad review was left.
- Another 2-star review for Gos (he gets the best ones, sorry Gos <3) A product receives a bad review because it was attached to a different attachment point then what the reviewer preferred, but there is nothing wrong with the construction of the product itself.
I wish people would keep in mind that the review system is there to benefit other consumers when they are about to purchase the product. If you are leaving a 1-star review for something that was not delivered to you properly or you didn’t look at all the content properly before reviewing or you are reviewing something poorly based on your own personal preference even though there is absolutely nothing wrong with the product itself, then you are doing a disservice. You are not only doing a disservice to the content creator, but to future consumers and in turn making the review system completely useless.
So this is just a friendly reminder before you leave your next review on marketplace, make sure you have your graphics settings setup correctly and you’ve checked all of the content in the folders appropriately. As for failed deliveries, it’s always best to contact the creator instead of leaving a bad review because again, it’s not their fault the item was not delivered properly!
Thanks for reading and please feel free to share any other unfair reviews you see often so people are more aware of how they review items in the future.
Credits:
*Skin: MONS / Shane Skin -brown brow-soft makeup- bronze tone V1 by Ekilem Melodie
Hair: [LeLutka]-MAGDALEN hair – Bournville by Thora Charron
Eyes: Mayfly – Deep Sky Mesh Eye (Deep Honey Hazel, w4) by Arkesh Baral
Ears: {Lemon Tea} Elven Ear by Sei Minuet
The best way to match the tint on these ears, are just to choose the lighter tone that matches your skin tone, and then edit the tint on the texture itself via the build/edit panel. I find it a lot easier to match tints this way rather than the HUDs, but that’s just my way 🙂
I almost always get a perfect tint (on MY windlight) when I do it that way.
Oh that’s brilliant Alvena, I never even thought of that and they are modify so it would be much easier to tint that way. Thanks for pointing that out!
its a great post berry, but tough thing as well for those on MP seek out stuff to give out 1star ratings, because they know how much it can damage someone’s business, how LL has rating on MP sucks :\ just because of 1star rating because they couldnt wait for the magic boxes being failed delivered, didnt read it properly, and didnt work of how they wanted, for us content creators having something on MP and if it gets a 1star review, usually would need 3 or 4, 5star reviews to even make it a 3 or 4star again. and can damage a proper business completely
If only the people who write those reviews read your blog!
Brilliant post! Something that has needed saying for a long while now and you did it wonderfully.
It’s so annoying to see so many low ranking reviews that have nothing to do with the actual product itself.
Ranking it low for non delivery is so silly. As you said that’s an LL issue and MP doesn’t tell creators when there is a review good/bad or otherwise so not contacting them and just giving a bad review is not accomplishing anything.
More people need to be aware of how useful it is to give a bad review just because of their own over site, or personal opinions of how something should look or should attach.
I get a lot of stuff off the Marketplace, and I try to be fair when I do reviews. If I don’t like something, I try to be specific as to why, and do so in a polite fashion.
When purchasing something, I also read the reviews first (if available), and take most one star reviews with a grain of salt…unless there’s 50 reviews and they’re ALL bad. Then I do the smart thing, and just don’t buy it. :o)
What Alvena said applies to anything modifiable, too!
I usually go for a reddish hair color that only a few places actually make — lighter and less red than what’s usually in red packs, but redder than anything in dark blond or light brown. I was running all over looking for more stores that had the color I like before it occurred to me that I could tint a bright orange a bit darker, or add a bit of orange-red to a dark blond or light brown. Most of the hair places do have a color that will tint nicely to my preferred hair color.
I have always been taught that if you don’t have anything nice to say – keep it to yourself, and if you do have nice things to say – say them out loud. Don’t mistake that with being fake or scared to say what’s on your mind. It’s all about being polite and respectful. If I don’t like the product I purchased, I just don’t wear it/trash it, leaving no review and move on. Of course I’d react different if I was cheated somehow or the product was “broken”, but even then I’d try contacting the creator first without makin scenes in “public”.
It is sad how much hate we meet in both worlds daily, I’m always trying to avoid it. That way my conscience stays clear and I have nothing to worry about. 🙂
From a creator’s point of view, I totally don’t get why a lot of people get totally worked up about even minor issues. I once had a customer shout at me and after I didn’t respond within like 30 seconds, he threatened to report me to LL (for what I dunno). Turned out, HE had bought something twice on the MP and demanded his money back (he demanded more than he originally paid, too).
Designers are people, too. If you approach them nicely, I’m sure most will respond likewise and be happy to help. Especially if you point out the problem before you leave a 1 star review. Also keep in mind, some of us are in different time zones and can’t react to everything immediately (I’m 9 hours ahead of SLT myself). And it would be most helpful, to leave a honest review once the issue is solved.
In my whole second life I have left one 1 star review and I kind of felt awful doing it. They were mesh feet with the most impossible hud used for tinting – more like pointing, clicking, and guessing, and then hoping for the best. Afterwards, she (or he) contacted me to talk about it and went above and beyond to fix the hud so that we could get RGB and then use a color picker. I changed my review afterwards.
I think it’s also important to not go by how many stars one gets, or read comments first before buying, as people can be dinks.
Thanks everyone for all your responses. <3
I just want to make clear that I have no issues with 1-star reviews at all, as long as they truthfully reflect the product. I know accurate 1-star reviews on marketplace have saved me from spending my money on things that are not good quality. A clear and accurate review of a product is a very valuable thing!
Thank you for this article. It is really a shame that people abuse the review system like this. It ends up hurting both consumers and creators.
I have received once a 1 star review on one of my make-up, just because the customer did not receive the article in time … in place of to wait or send me a notecard with details, he gave me 1 star … so stupid.
PREACH!
LL is actually pretty good about removing reviews that have nothing whatsoever to do with either the product or customer service, but about delivery, misreading of the listing, not understanding how SL works, etc. They removed one for me last week from a customer who had never contacted me but said the house was terrible because she kept deleting it — despite a reminder in the notecard to keep it locked in the Object tab. She put the review back up and they deleted it again.
The key is to monitor your listings as best you can (since LL does not send a review notice) and add a comment explaining why the review has nothing to do with the product itself or the quality of customer service, then flag it.
However, there is not much to be done about a review that simply gives a false review of the product — it may be false but it is nevertheless a review of the product itself. However, I have found that if you leave an explanatory comment, the bad review does not affect sales at all.
Great post Berry!
truth be told, above it all, reviews became a weapon, a way to threaten the creator and/or to pull down the competition.
RIP xstreetsl, you are dearly missed
Yea LL are very good at removing reviews that are misfiled. I’ve had bad reviews for products not being delivered, people not reading the description, the object not fitting micro avs etc. All of which LL has gone over and removed after a few days, so bad reviewes arn’t that damaging if your product and discription is ok, you just need, as a merchant, to follow up on the reviews people give you.
Consumer reviews are never going to be fair. There’s yet to be a system that manages it. So we will always be vindictive or uneducated reviews, etc. What you have to remember is that the person reading the review is not mindless and should be capable of figuring out which reviews are of value and which aren’t. In my experience there are usually just as many useless 5-star reviews from the creator’s friends, etc. Creators have recourse to LL to have negative reviews removed, consumers do not have the same luxury of removing 5-star reviews that are obvious plants.
Also, it’s important to remember that even improper reviews can serve a useful consumer purpose. If LL keeps getting requests to remove a lot of “item was not delivered” comments, that is going to put pressure on them to fix the delivery problems. Likewise, while comments about personal preferences aren’t necessarily appropriate, they will lead creators to include more information in their descriptions and may possibly even lead to changes in the product itself.
I have not noticed a great increase of improper use of the Marketplace feedback system, and I’m using it far more than I ever have before, so maybe our experiences differ. Still, I think the system still gives the advantage to the creator more than the consumer.